Tag Archives: Clothing

Was watching TV last night on my fantastic wonderful leather recliner, all cozy and comfy, wrapped in a blanket – a mini nirvana episode. At some point I passed out cold and slept like a rock.

I vaguely remember Mr. Husband being as sweet and gentle as a lamb. He really can be such a big tender pussy cat sometimes. He managed to talk me up out of the recliner. No easy task, mind you, because this is one of the pillowy kind that you sink into and never want to come out of.

I remember him talking like it was in a dream. “Come on, Sweetie, let’s get you to bed.” He succeeded and then brought me a big glass of water because he knows I wake up in the night thirsty, so thirsty. One of the temporary side effects of the meds I’m on is dry mouth. That’s putting it mildly. I wake up and my mouth is so dry that my teeth are stuck together and I’m almost choking.

So I woke up this morning in my clothes. Now it’s not like I was wearing a sequined evening gown. I was wearing corduroy leggings and a long-sleeved waffle weave T-shirt yesterday. Easy enough to pass off as pajamas.

My first thought upon waking was “oh God, I slept in my clothes.” That is one of my mental markers that things are not right. My usual routine at night is a shower and then changing into jammies. My second thought was “Wow, this is so cool, I’m dressed! If I want to leave the house all I have to do is throw on a pair of shoes and a jacket. I don’t have to figure out what to put on.” And so I did leave the house just for the hell of it, and to get some smokes because I was completely out.

Maybe I’m on to something here. At night instead donning pajamas after a shower I could just put on some clean clothes. No one pays attention to wrinkled clothes these days – it’s the style anyway.

Or maybe not, but it is sooo tempting. However, realistically speaking, I really do feel much better when I take care of myself and change into jammies at night. It’s a ritual that is good for me. It tells my body and brain that it’s time to ramp it down a notch and consider going to bed at a reasonable hour. As opposed to staying up half the night because I’m having a blast doing whatever it is I’m doing. I pay for it the next day and end up dragging around like dried up leftover meat loaf. Having a hangover from poor sleep habits without even drinking is not so fun.

Wear a girdle? What? My knee jerk reaction is usually just say “NO.” But I bought a fancy highbrow floor length cocktail gown to wear to a wedding. I love the dress but when I put it on without proper foundation garments I felt like a potato sack sprayed with glitter, so off to the ladies lingerie department I went.

They don’t call them girdles anymore, they’re called Spanxs. Sounds rather sinful, but it’s better than the former name. It has a padded booty and the whole nine yards. I was cracking up laughing when cramming myself into it in the dressing room. Sort of like trying put on an octopus that was fighting back, but once finished I thought “hey, this just might work!”

Then we move on to the bosom department. They don’t have bras designed for women with actual bossomage who plan to wear plunging necklines anymore. They used to make them, I swear, I owned one. Turns out you have to buy this sort of slithery gooey silicon bra thingy that you literally glue on to your boobs. This is going to be interesting.

What if one of them pops off at the reception and puts the eye out of whoever is seated across the table? What if they get stuck and won’t come off when I’m finished with them? Will I have to go to the emergency room to have them removed? Or wear them for the rest of my life? I’ve heard that women swear by them, but I have my doubts. We shall see. (Update: I tried them on. It was like trying to stuff water balloons into a teacup) However, it’s better than nothing or erupting out of my bodice if leaning too far over the party platter. Although that would make an interesting conversation starter.

If all goes wrong and my undergarments go totally awry, my plan B is to get so tipsy at the reception that I either don’t care what I look like or Mr. Husband decides that it’s time to put me to bed for the night -whatever works.

Perhaps I should arrange for a film crew in case I’m passed out cold and Mr. Husband tries to get the girdle, I mean Spanxs, off me without my assistance. I’m sure it would go viral on YouTube. Hmm…maybe not. They say everyone gets their 15 minutes of fame but I don’t think that’s how I want it. I guess he could just hang me in the closet and cut it off. I seriously doubt I will ever wear it again.

Dressing up can be rather stressful. Sometimes I understand why many people gave up on it all together. But it’s also a lot of fun when you get yourself all pulled together and feel like a million bucks. Yowza!

On this journey to reinvent a me that I can live with, I’ve decided to take baby steps. Or maybe treat myself like someone with a catastrophic brain injury who has to learn how to do everything over again. Could I just reformat my brain? Nah, that would wipe out the good along with the not useful knowledge.

Possession Purge the Easy Way

This fresh brain theory is as much of a gift as finding yourself suddenly without possessions. This may sound horrible, but hear me out. I’ve ended up with little more than the clothes on my back 4 times in my life. Once was from a natural disaster (flood).

Another time was when I made the mistake of living at what turned out to be a “crime scene.” I came home one day and the police had been there and emptied out my entire apartment. They must have hired some really good movers because there weren’t even scraps of paper left on the floor.

The lowdown on this particular fiasco was – the guy I was dating at the tender age of 18 was a crook. What did I know? Up until that time all the movies I watched were Disney movies. Never saw a movie called “This is What Happens When Unbeknownst to You, Your Boyfriend Turns Out to be a Thief – Surprise.” That’s a long story for another day. I was classified by the powers that be as collateral damage, even though I was exonerated from any knowledge or participation in said nefarious activities. A few months later I went to the property lock up place and they handed over a box with a toothbrush, a couple of paper backs and a pair of jeans. This was all I got back from an entire furnished apartment.

The 3rd possession wipe out happened when I realized that husband #1 was plotting to declare me crazy and commit me to an institution of higher insanity. (We’d been having serious marital discord leading up to this revelation – it wasn’t a shot out of the blue) That’s what his father did to his mother when she didn’t “behave,” so there ya go. I left right in the middle of dinner. My fork was probably still suspended in mid-air when I put peddle to the metal and got the hell out of dodge.

He changed the locks the very next day. I guess he knew that I was lying when I said I was going out for a pack of smokes. My daughter helped me this time. She said “mom, I was always losing my keys. How do you think I got back in the house?” She jimmied a window open and we went in like a ninja stealth team and grabbed anything handy that belonged to me, stuffed it in trash bags and were out in 15 minutes. Breaking in your house and stealing your own stuff is how you experience exhilaration and humiliation in the same day. I don’t recommend it.

Books before

The 4th drastic possession reduction happened when I moved back to the mainland from 8 years in Guam. This time it was a planned wipe out because I couldn’t afford to ship all my junk back to the states. I packed a backpack and a suitcase and left my apartment and all the junk collected in 8 years behind. It felt good, really good.

Hmmm, an idea has occurred to me. Am I doing this all backwards? Maybe I should just pack up like I was going on an extended trip and donate the rest the stuff to charity? That might make Mr. Husband a little nervous. But I’m not leaving…forever. Just want to travel, my love. If you think that I would leave you after 10 years of thick and thin, better and worse, love and hate, then you don’t know me at all! Oh no, I love you and yer not getting rid of me that easy.

Books after

So anyway, on day 1, I got a 3rd of the way through my massive book collection. Mr. Husband was so gracious about it that I was flabbergasted. He used his manly man muscles, picked up the heavy boxes of books, put them in his truck and dropped them off at the good will collection center. I only asked him once. This is a sign I’m moving in the right direction. It felt so good that I coasted for a day.

And now back to day 2, which did not occur immediately after day 1, but so what? My purchase criteria for clothes used to be “will I be embarrassed to wear that to work?” That’s not valid anymore, but the majority of my clothing is business casual = booooring. So why do I have them now? Am I planning on going back to corporate life? That would be a resounding NO. I paid a lot of money for them, that’s why. Well that money is gone, sunk costs. Ah, deep breaths. Let it go.

I’m having trouble letting go of my old office clothes. And the things I might fit in again someday clothes, the just in case T-shirts, and the junk jewelry to match. The list goes on… Thought it was going to be easy. Maybe even fun, but I was wrong wrong wrong.

They are representatives of fear, regret and way to much money spent on stuff to “fit in” and look anonymous and nonthreatening. There is a certain comfort in ugly anonymous clothes. Part of me is keeping them in case I ever find the need to work in an office again. Yuck. But I hated the office, the clothes, the whole stifling atmosphere. So why keep them? It doesn’t make sense to my logical self. But the scaredy cat self is hanging on for dear life.

I feel like a smoker who quits but doesn’t toss the cigarettes in case they “need” them or the boozer who keeps a pint stashed somewhere. Is there a clothes horse anonymous? Maybe I need to go to meetings. What would they be wearing?

I have to admit to myself and another human being the exact nature of my wrongs and make amends wherever possible. I have to admit that I have no control over this clothing obsession and give all this stuff to charity. Somewhere there is someone who is starting out in the office world and doesn’t want to spend and arm and a leg for the uniform.

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About me

I’m a woman of a certain age living and loving in Texas. Can’t get real specific because I’m a work in process. I Like to read sci-fi, steampunk and historical fiction, travel all over the planet, stay home on rainy days, go shopping in the middle of the night, and stay be in bed when I should be doing something.